This document contains three papers concerned with prevention intervention research, a new area of depression research which has shown great promise for contributing new knowledge to the understanding of depression. The first paper, "Clinical Trials vs. Prevention Trials: Methodological Issues in Depression Research" (Ricardo F. Munoz), emphasizes…

This keynote address reviews previous efforts at developing a research policy agenda for child abuse and neglect, reviews medical research directions in child sexual abuse, suggests the author's views of potential research areas, and suggests a policy infrastructure to further implementation of the conference's proposals. (DB)

The current challenge in distance education is to determine the ways in which research can assist practice in fostering communication. Research in distance education may be broken down into three approaches: (1) practical and descriptive studies that give little attention to conceptual underpinnings; (2) application of conceptual models from…

By comparing the first and fourth editions of a research methods text, the author identifies and discusses some major changes in educational research metholodogy that have occurred over the past 20 years. Some of the changes relate to ethics and legal constraints in conducting research, research and development, evaluation research, the…

Instructional Research Online (InTRO) was established in 1994 as a repository of research papers, media, and other artifacts related to research in instructional technology. The World Wide Web site (http://intro.base.org) includes sections on reviews of books and media, original research, links to resources in instructional technology, and…

A review of literature examining how children are affected by women's employment was conducted. The review focused on the changes during the past two decades in the general approach of the researchers, with a specific focus on researcher bias and use of theory. First, literature reviews from the past three decades were conducted. Second, the work…

The most legitimate role that the independent research can play in a collaborative research effort in the schools is that of intermediary or broker. Researchers need to establish good relations with school administrative staff and teachers, allaying their mistrust of outside researchers. Research should be carefully designed to relate as directly…

Australian education and training and vocational education and training (VET) research are in a state of crisis. Both the higher education and VET sectors are now squeezed and subject to contradictory objectives, multiple accountabilities, heightened expectations, and diminished resources in an environment of uncertainty and frustration. The…

This essay focuses on a key change that the author has experienced in the practice of program evaluation research over the past 20 years: the accommodation of the logic of science and the psychology of politics. This change has substantially altered the role of the evaluator, the evaluator's relationship with clients, the design of an evaluation…

The Northern Arizona University Career Ladder Research and Evaluation Project for teachers implements a procedure for rewarding teachers based on performance levels rather than on years of teaching experience and college credits. Research data is collected each spring, analyzed and fed back to the districts for improvement of key program…

A review of recent literature and commission reports identifies persistent problems in two areas of educational administration: research and preparation programs. The two problems are linked in that they are often supervised by faculty who direct but do not themselves perform research. Two areas of research needs are the poor research skills of…

Fifteen years' experience of conducting politically controversial statewide research on rural/small school and Alaska Native educational issues in Alaska forms the background of this paper, which identifies practical strategies for gaining access to sites and data, developing support for research enterprises, and communicating information in ways…

This review of the literature addresses scientific and methodological concerns of research with children from various racial and ethnic backgrounds in the United States. It first identifies three major demographic trends: (1) the increasingly multiethnic and multilingual nature of American society; (2) the increasing number of children in poverty;…

Vocational education and training (VET) research in Australia has changed dramatically in the last 10 years. In a 1993 report titled "No Small Change," VET research was characterized as a fragmented activity that was underfunded and had little or no relevance to policy or practice in the VET sector. Since that time, increased funding through the…

A study examined vocational education research and development (R&D) during the period from 1963 to 1983. Individually funded and government-funded R&D efforts in the following 15 categories were compared: career development and guidance, special populations, students, personnel, instructional techniques, curriculum development, demography,…